The Daughter of an Empress eBook

And, without waiting for an answer from the regent,
the old man, groaning, tottered out of the room.

“Thank Heaven that he is gone!” said Anna,
drawing a long breath when the door closed behind
him. “This old ghost-seer has tormented
me for months with his strange vagaries, which weigh
upon his soul like the nightmare! Happily, thy
letter, my beloved, has filled my whole heart with
the ecstasy of joy, else would his dark and foolish
prophecies be sufficient to sadden me.”

Thus speaking, the princess again drew Count Lynar’s
letter from her bosom and pressed it to her lips.
Then she called her women to dress her for the ball.

THE COURT BALL

Some hours later the elite of the higher Russian
nobility were assembled in the magnificent halls of
the regent. Princes and counts, generals and
diplomatists, beautiful women and blooming maidens,
all moved in a confused intermixture, jesting and
laughing with each other. They were all very
gay on this evening, as the regent had herself set
the example. With the most unconstrained cheerfulness,
radiant with joy, did she wander through the rooms,
dispensing smiles and agreeable words among all whom
she approached. She bore in her bosom the glowing
and cherished letter of her lover, and at its lightest
rustling she seemed to feel the immediate presence
of the writer. That was the secret of her gayety
and her joyous smiles. People, perhaps, knew not
this secret, but they saw its effects, and, as the
all-powerful regent deigned this day to be cheerful
and smiling, it was natural for this host of slavish
nobility, who breathe nothing but the air of the court,
to adopt for this evening’s motto, “Gayety
and smiles.”

As we have said, only smiling lips and faces beaming
with joy were to be seen; all breathed pleasure and
enjoyment, all jested and laughed; it seemed as if
all care and sorrow had fled from this happy, select
circle, to give place to the delights of life.
They had, with submissive humility, repressed all
discontent and disaffection, all envyings and enmities;
they chatted and laughed, while every one knew or suspected
that they were standing on a volcano, whose overwhelming
eruptions might be expected at any moment, and yet
every one feigned the most perfect innocence and unconstraint.
The ladies scrutinized each other’s magnificent
and costly toilets, jesting and exchanging amorous
glances with the gentlemen displaying orders and diamond
crosses.

A movement suddenly arose in the rooms, the crowd
divided and respectfully withdrew to the sides, and
through the rows of smiling, humbly bowing courtiers
passed the Princess Elizabeth, followed by her chamberlain
Woronzow, her private secretary Alexis Razumovsky,
and her physician Lestocq, in the splendor of her
beauty and grace, all kindness, all smiles. She
was to-day wonderfully charming in her gold-spangled
lace dress, which flowed like a breath over her under-dress